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Marine Life & Conservation Blogs

Divers, Protect our Seas.

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As divers and lovers of the ocean, we need to understand and protect this now fragile environment. We are the few who actually visit and see what is going on below the water. For those of you who have been diving many years, you will have seen the degradation of marine life and habitat first hand. For those newer to diving take stock of what we have and help to protect it.

There are many factors contributing to the demise of the world’s oceans. Pollution, climate change and over-fishing are the three most obvious. Globally, these issues are slowly being addressed but over-fishing is still knocking on the back door of reason. We still continue to support factory industrial fishing by buying their products. As I see fish stocks diminishing every year I know we have passed the point where sustainable commercial fishing is a viable option. We keep species on the brink of commercial extinction and are then alarmed when they crash. We are changing the very nature of our oceans, and not for the better.

I was recently on a UK off-island enjoying the peace and relative isolation from modern day trappings. As I sat on a quiet beach, I saw a seal rise out of the water just a few hundred meters from the shore. It stayed on the surface for about thirty seconds and then sank out of site. Lovely. Then to my surprise it surfaced after a few minutes in exactly the same spot. This happened a few more times before I realised with absolute sadness that the seal was trapped by something and was fighting to the surface for air before being dragged back down.  What could I do…….Nothing…. It was very cold and I had no wet suit to swim out and try to help. But even if I did the danger and risk of being caught myself was high as well as the possibility of being bitten by the panicking seal. I tried to phone a few local people to ask if anyone with a boat could help. But there was no signal and I knew in my heart that there were no boats anywhere near. I ran to the top of the hill and tried to call again. My fears were confirmed. There was no one who could help.

I went back down to the water and could only watch as the seal continued to fight for its life, surfacing every few minutes and taking deep breaths before being pulled under by what ever it was. On the beach next to me was part of a washed up fishing net. This was more than likely the kind of thing trapping the seal. I watched for half an hour. Caught up in my emotions and helplessness. I desperately wanted the seal to break free but I knew that was not going to happen. After another hour I wished the seal not to come up again so that its suffering was at an end.  But it kept fighting. I stayed there until it started getting dark. In some stupid way I felt I should keep it company. To say you are not alone and will be remembered.

The tide was rising, making the seal’s struggle to the surface harder with every passing minute. I had to leave. I didn’t go back to see if it fought throughout the night, although I have know seals and other marine mammals have done that. In the end the seal would have finally drowned and is now resting on the sea bed, bloated and entangled. If I had not seen this happening no one would have ever known. How much more is there happening out of sight that we just don’t witness.

As I was writing this I was introduced to Ocean Rebellion who have just produced a short film shot in Cornwall on netting and trawling. It is a stark film called ‘No More Fish In The Sea’ and can be seen on YouTube. It shows a Mermaid trapped and drowning in a net. You may think this over the top, but the horrors of drowning, in any circumstance, are the same for all air breathing animals, whales, dolphins, seals, sea birds, otters and many others and must not be ignored just because most victims are not human. If you can, watch the video and think hard about what it is saying.

‘No More Fish In The Sea’

The introduction to the video says:

Due to industrial fishing practices there is now no such thing as sustainable fishing. If we transform our fishing practices this could change. We need to end the wholesale destruction of the ocean through factory fishing on an industrial scale.

Ocean rebellion is calling for an end to industrial fishing practices and an end to bottom trawling now.

Bottom trawling is a devastating form of fishing that wreaks havoc on the sea bed, ripping up swathes of precious marine habitats and killing vast amounts of sea life. For every bottom trawled fish on your plate up to 16 other fish will have been caught and killed.

Living oceans mean a living planet and a living humankind. But humans are killing the oceans. When they die, we die. Their future hangs in the balance – and with them the future of humans and all life on Earth. Ocean Rebellion will help turn the tide.

Bottom trawling is killing us all.

Oceanic wildlife has a wonderful ability to recover if we leave it alone.

OCEAN REBELLION

Because the sea is rising we will rise

Because the coral is fading we will fight

As the seas are mined we will mobilise

While the oceans are plundered we will protest

Lifeguards wanted

Join us.

https://oceanrebellion.earth/

Jeff is a multiple award winning, freelance TV cameraman/film maker and author. Having made both terrestrial and marine films, it is the world's oceans and their conservation that hold his passion with over 10.000 dives in his career. Having filmed for international television companies around the world and author of two books on underwater filming, Jeff is Author/Programme Specialist for the 'Underwater Action Camera' course for the RAID training agency.Jeff has experienced the rapid advances in technology for diving as well as camera equipment and has also experienced much of our planet’s marine life, witnessing, first hand, many of the changes that have occurred to the wildlife and environment during that time.Jeff runs bespoke underwater video and editing workshops for the complete beginner up to the budding professional.

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The Ocean Cleanup Launches 30 Cities Program to Cut Ocean Plastic Pollution from Rivers by One Third by 2030

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The Ocean Cleanup

The Ocean Cleanup, the international non-profit with the mission to rid the world’s oceans of plastic, has announced, at the UN Ocean Conference (UNOC), its plan to rapidly expand its work to intercept and remove ocean-bound plastic pollution.

The 30 Cities Program will scale the organization’s proven Interceptor™ solutions across 30 key cities in Asia and the Americas, aiming to eliminate up to one third of all plastic flowing from the world’s rivers into the ocean before the end of the decade.

This evolution follows five years of learning through pioneering deployments across 20 of the world’s most polluting rivers and represents a key next step in the organization’s mission and the global fight against ocean plastic pollution.

The Ocean Cleanup

With the 30 Cities Program, The Ocean Cleanup will transition from single river deployments to citywide solutions, tackling the main plastic emitting waterways within each selected city. This follows a key learning from deployments in Kingston, Jamaica, which showed it is possible to scale faster when projects encompass whole cities, as the same set of partners can be involved with all deployments.

To date, The Ocean Cleanup has already prevented 29 million kilograms of trash from reaching the ocean. The organization currently intercepts an estimated 1–3 percent of global river-borne plastic emissions. With the first 20 river deployments close to being fully operational, it is now poised to reduce the plastic pollution flowing into the ocean from rivers by up to a third.

“When we take on an entire city, instead of individual rivers, we can scale faster, reduce costs, and maximize impact,” said Boyan Slat, Founder and CEO of The Ocean Cleanup. “Our analysis shows that strategically deploying Interceptors across just 30 carefully chosen cities can stop up to a third of river plastic pollution worldwide. This is the next big leap toward our ultimate goal of a 90  percent reduction in global ocean plastic pollution.”

City-by-city: a Faster Path to Scaling

Using the latest scientific modeling and on the ground experience, The Ocean Cleanup identified 30 major plastic polluting coastal cities which include:

Panama City, Panama – First deployment to go live in the coming months.
Mumbai, India – Mapping of all waterways completed; preparations for first deployments underway.

Furthermore, the organization is developing plans to expand on its existing work to all polluting rivers in:

• Manila, Philippines; Montego Bay, Jamaica; Jakarta, Indonesia; Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia; Bangkok, Thailand and Los Angeles, U.S.A.

Other cities will be announced once the necessary partnerships and agreements are in place. Planning and fundraising activities are underway for all 30 cities. To realize these ambitious plans, the organization is currently also expanding its engineering and operational capacity.

Data Driven Restoration at Scale

Before Interceptors are deployed, each city project begins with an intensive analysis phase. Aerial drones, AI-powered image analysis, and GPS-tagged “dummy” plastics are used to chart every visible waterway and track how waste moves from streets to sea. These real-time insights guide optimal Interceptor placement and provide a public baseline against which progress can be measured.

Alongside intercepting new plastic, the 30 Cities Program will also remove debris from nearby coasts, mangroves, and coral reefs. This twin-track approach—shutting off the tap while clearing the legacy pollution—enables The Ocean Cleanup to achieve long-term impact, which includes the restoration of fish nursery habitats, boosting coastal tourism, and strengthening of natural storm surge defenses for local communities. Alongside local partners, the organization also advocates for improvements in waste management and awareness raising amongst communities.

The Ocean Cleanup

Completing the First 20 Rivers

While laying the foundation for the 30 Cities Program, The Ocean Cleanup is also nearing completion of its first 20 river projects. The next landmark achievement—expected as soon as the second half of this year—is in the western Caribbean, where the team aims to resolve the plastic pollution problem in the Gulf of Honduras by intercepting the trash feeding into this body of water.

A Stepping Stone Toward a 90  Percent Reduction

The 30 Cities Program represents the first major scaling step in The Ocean Cleanup’s journey to eliminate 90 percent of floating ocean plastic pollution. In parallel, efforts are continuing to remove plastic from the Great Pacific Garbage Patch. Whilst extraction operations are currently on hiatus, work to deploy cutting edge technologies to map the “hotspots”, or areas of intense plastic accumulation, in order to make future extractions more efficient and economical, is ongoing.

By combining river interception and coastal cleanup with its offshore cleanup systems targeting legacy pollution that’s already in the ocean, the organization is charting a path to turn off the tap and mop up the mess.

The Ocean Cleanup

About The Ocean Cleanup

The Ocean Cleanup is a nonprofit organization that develops and scales technologies to rid the oceans of plastic. By conducting extensive research, engineering scalable solutions, and partnering with governments, industry, and like-minded organizations, The Ocean Cleanup is working to stop plastic inflow via rivers and remove legacy plastic already polluting the oceans. As of June 2025, the non-profit has collected over 28 million kilograms (62 million pounds) of trash from aquatic ecosystems around the world. Founded in 2013 by Boyan Slat, The Ocean Cleanup now employs a multi-disciplined team of approximately 200 people. The organization is headquartered in Rotterdam, the Netherlands, with international operations in 10 countries. For more information, visit www.theoceancleanup.com.

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Rescues, Rays, and Darwin the Turtle: My Trip to Biomes Marine Biology Center

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biomes

It’s time to catch up with 12-year-old Mia DaPonte, New England’s youngest ever female PADI Master Scuba Diver, in her latest blog for Scubaverse!

It’s still a little too cold to get in the water here in New England. I wish I had a drysuit! To get my ocean fix, I asked my mom to take me and my friends to the Biomes Marine Biology Center.

What is Biomes? It’s a rescue center near my house that’s home to all kinds of ocean animals—and they’re all local! It’s truly awesome to experience. There are so many cool creatures there, like skates, sharks, stingrays, horseshoe crabs, tropical fish, lobsters, seahorses, octopuses, and even some reptiles that were given up by their owners.

biomes

Darwin the turtle is always fun to watch. He’s huge and has his own home, but he also gets to wander around the place on his own when he feels like it!

They have lots of touch tanks. I got to touch sharks, turtles, and even hold a horseshoe crab! (There’s a little lip on the side of their shell where you can hold them—but don’t do this without permission! Their gills always need to stay in the water.) I also touched stingrays! They felt slimy but rough at the same time.

biomes

One of my favorite things to do is see the octopus and watch it play with the toys in its tank. I always check to see if any seahorses are pregnant and look for the babies when they’re born. The babies are kept in their own tank at first to stay safe, and then moved when they’re big enough.

We got lucky this time—there was a baby skate in a mermaid’s purse that was ready to hatch any day! It was in a special tank with a light. When you press the button, the light turns on so you can see the baby skate moving around inside the purse!

biomes

As our visit was ending, the owner, Mark, sat down with us and told us how he started Biomes. When he was 14 years old, he began rescuing sea animals. His love for the ocean started when he was young—just like mine! As he got older, he started a traveling business, bringing animals to classrooms and doing shows. Eventually, he turned it into something bigger, and now Biomes is a huge center full of rescued animals.

He told us that most of the fish and animals are rescued from fishing boats or the cold waters of New England—places where tropical fish wouldn’t survive the winter. They try to rescue babies whenever they can, so they have a better chance of adapting. Darwin the turtle actually hatched in Mark’s hand!

biomes

My mom gets a pass to Biomes every year because I love going there so much. There are always new animals to see and feedings to watch. One time, I even got to feed the octopus!

If you ever come to Rhode Island, you have to check out Biomes!

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